


Of Ex-Wives, In-Laws, and Other Misadventures

by Severina



Category: Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
Genre: M/M, Small Fandom Big Bang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-07
Updated: 2012-04-07
Packaged: 2017-11-03 04:29:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/377301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dealing with an attack on the precinct is bad enough, but when you throw in ex-wives, kids, parents, and one pesky reporter? John and Matt are in for a <i>very</i> busy week.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Ex-Wives, In-Laws, and Other Misadventures

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LJ's SmallFandomBang community.
> 
> * * *

**Monday**

The one really great benefit to working at home is that Matt actually doesn't have to get dressed.

Today, for example. He's working on shoring up the defenses for one of the many, _many_ multinational corporations that got in touch after he appeared at the press conference with John and Bowman and the governor, the "hacker hero" label emblazoned under his face as he wobbled unsteadily next to John on his crutches. Turns out helping a cop save the world – or at least helping a cop save the cop's daughter and America's money – is the best networking _ever_. 

Of course, right now he's "taking a break". Said break is already heading into its third hour, and mostly consists of killing _Rising Dead_ zombies with a high-powered rifle while occasionally stopping to lick cheese doodle dust off his fingers.

Which is also the second really great benefit to working at home. 

When the doorbell rings he seriously considers not answering it, except John hates it when he does that. The last five times the doorbell has rung in the middle of the day it's been either someone stumping for a political candidate or a Jehovah's Witness, both of whom he usually scares off by pretending to be a Satanist. John hates that too, but then John votes republican so his opinion totally doesn't count. 

When the bell rings a second time he cocks his head, listening for the heavy tread of John's feet on the stairs. But the sound of the chainsaw – or jigsaw or hacksaw or whatever the hell kind of saw – going off in the basement continues unabated. John says that whatever he's making down there is going to be a liquor cabinet. To Matt it currently looks like a snowflake with feet, but when John emerges from these afternoons in the basement he's usually all hot and sweaty and virile and there's no part of that that's not a win, so he gleefully encourages John's use of power tools on his rare weekdays off.

When the chimes go off a third time Matt huffs out a sigh, hits pause just as one of the undead is reaching for his throat, and hauls himself out of the chair. He's mentally preparing his "I am a servant of Beelzebub" speech when he opens the door.

Which is how he comes to meet Holly Gennero while wearing only a pair of low-slung pajama pants, a tattered T-shirt liberally smeared with bright orange doodle dust, and a scowl.

"Uh," he says. Because he's quick on his feet like that.

She looks ten years younger than he imagined, her hair still mostly untouched by grey and the crinkled lines around her eyes proving that she laughs easily and often. When she smiles, another five years drop off and those eyes sparkle and he can suddenly see what he never sees in that tattered family photo in John's wallet -- the reason that John fell for her.

Well, that smile and that she apparently has a mean right hook, at least according to that old archival footage of her decking Richard Thornburg. 

"Hello," she says. "You must be Matt. I'm--"

"Holly," Matt say quickly. "Holly Gennero. John's… wow. Hi." He shakes his head, holds out a hand. "Right. Yes. Hey. I'm Matt. Matthew. Matt Farrell."

Her hand closes firmly over his, fingers chilled from the air even through her soft leather gloves, and when she cocks her head he sees a hint of Lucy in the way she appraises him. But her tone is light and teasing when she says, "Well, Matt Matthew Matt, that's quite the moniker you've got there."

"Matt's fine," he says, tells himself he absolutely will not blush in front of John's ex-fucking-wife. He realizes he's still holding her hand and drops it quickly, realizes at the same time that he's standing there with his mouth open and she's shivering in a light jacket that's more suited for California autumns and not a porch in the middle of a New York winter and wow, he's occasionally an idiot. "You're here for… come in, there's snow and… John's in the basement, I'll just get…"

"Holly," John says from behind him. 

Matt doesn't think he's ever heard John use that particular tone of voice before. He doesn't say Holly's name so much as breathe it out, leave it hanging on the air like a puff of smoke.

"Hi, John."

* * *

John drapes her coat over the back of a chair, brushes the sawdust from his hands and busies himself with pouring out the coffee and fetching cream from the fridge while she tells him about her flight and her upcoming conference.

Holly wraps her hands around the steaming mug, dips her head to inhale the fragrance before taking a tentative sip. 

It takes John back, all the way back to the first mornings of their marriage, when he was still driving around in a beaten-up black and white with old Harry Davies and Holly was working on her Masters and pulling swing shifts at the diner. It had been hard, all of it – hard to make ends meet, hard living in a cramped cold-water flat, hard to make time for each other. But he remembers that no matter how rushed Holly'd been she always took the time each morning to savour the anticipation of that first swig of java.

"Mmm," she murmurs appreciatively. "Much better than the swill they're serving in the NEA club lounge." 

"Peruvian. I think," John says. Matt usually picks the beans, because Matt's the one who cares about that shit. Back in the day, he and Holly had been happy to have a jar of Maxwell House in the cupboard. Times change. 

She nods, leans back in her chair and takes another sip. "I read about your latest arrest," she starts, and when he quirks an eyebrow – those things don't show up in the L.A. papers, no matter how big the bust is to the NYPD – she waves a hand airily. "Lucy sends me the URLs. Jeon-Hoon?"

"Korean nationalist," John says, "with ties to half a dozen suspected terrorist cells. Been working that case for eight months, Hol, with fuck-all to show for it. He had some high tech security bullshit on his system, something using subsonic sound waves. Matt comes in, works his fucking mojo, and boom. We get Hoon on tape six days later. Dates, names, places, the whole fucking shebang. We can take down a lot of players now, mess up a lot of the bad guys plans. That arrest belongs to the kid as much as me."

"I had no idea Matt worked with you now."

"Nah. Comes in one, two times a week for a couple of hours, consulting only. Task force pays him about a tenth of what he's worth, but—"

"But he does it for you."

"He does it because it's the right thing to do," John says. He sets his own mug down on the scarred table, cocks his head. "Why are you here, Holly? You didn't drive all the way out to Brooklyn from some posh hotel in the city just to shoot the shit."

"No, I _do_ have a conference." She leans forward, crosses her legs – she's still got great gams, and John sure as hell ain't above looking – and meet his eyes. "But I also flew in a day early so I could talk to you. About Jack. And… about Matt."

John feels the bristles rise, clenches his fingers around the handle of his mug. What he and Matt have is… different from what he's used to, but it's also right. He feels it in his gut, knows it every time he looks at the damn kid. "You know I'm here for whatever Jack needs," he says, "but you have no right to say shit to me about Matthew Farrell."

"It's something we should talk about—"

"No," John bites out. "You're not my fucking wife, Holly, and you don't get—"

"John," Holly says. "I'm not here to criticize your…" She shakes her head, curls catching in the light, and he flashes back again to another kitchen table on another Monday afternoon, another argument. Holly not understanding why he had to stay in New York, John himself refusing to believe that she'd make it in L.A. Sometimes he thinks he can see all the hurtful things they said to one another still hanging in the air between them, dark images fluttering just beyond his conscious sight, clogging their air and making it hard to breathe.

He sighs, forces his fingers to release their iron grip on the mug. "Holly," he starts.

"I was just surprised," she says, "when Lucy told me about the… nature of your relationship with Matt. Surprised and, quite frankly, a little worried."

"You don't need to worry about me, Holly. I'm fine."

"I wasn't worried about you, John," Holly says, and now there's a trace of that old familiar teasing sarcasm in her tone, the one that she always used to remind him that the world didn't actually revolve around him. "I was worried… wondering… about…" She places her own mug on the table, traces a manicured finger around the rim. "John," she begins again, "we were married a long time. And when Lucy told me about you and Matt, I thought… well, I wasn't sure what to think."

John blinks. Sometimes it takes him a while, but the light bulb does finally turn on. He reaches out, wraps her cool fingers in his own. "It's the first time, Hol. It ain't like I was in the closet when we were married, and there sure as fuck won't be anyone else after him. It's just… Matt. Just him."

Holly holds his gaze for a long moment before pulling her hand away, smiling sheepishly. "All right," she says. When she leans back in her chair the vulnerability is gone as though it never existed, and he sees how she can broker multimillion dollar deals without breaking a sweat. "From everything Lucy tells me, he sounds like a great guy."

"He's a fucking smartass," John grouses. "He talks too much and he drinks too much Red Bull – you ever tasted that shit? Might as well mainline syrup – and he looks like a goddamn hippy. But the worse thing about Matthew Farrell," John adds, leaning back in his chair, "is his regrettable tendency to _eavesdrop_."

He catches Holly's eye, jerks his head toward the archway just as Matt pokes his head awkwardly around the corner. He's still barefoot, but he's changed into faded jeans and a couple of layers of shirts, and even with his ex in the room John feels the same clench in his chest that he always does when Matt walks into a room, and the twitch in his fingers to strip off those layers and find the warm skin beneath.

"Uh," Matt says. "I can totally explain."

John folds his arms at his chest. "Uh huh."

"Okay, first, John, you have to accept the hypothesis that curiosity is a natural human inclination, one that society frowns upon because of anachronistic social mores. Add to that the expected interest one has in one's self – human are naturally self-centred, okay, and studies have actually shown that—"

"Told you he talks too much," John interrupts. 

"What?" Matt huffs out. "No, you _asked_ , I'm just trying to—"

"In other words, you heard us talking about you and you were nosy," John says. He rolls his eyes, turns to Holly. "What do you think?"

"I think you have your hands full," she laughs, "but I'm inclined to forgive him, John. God knows I've been curious enough about him."

" _Thank_ you," Matt says, strolls into the kitchen and grabs his own mug. "And I didn't even mention that I could smell the coffee brewing and it's been _hours_ since…" He takes a sip from his mug, smiles happily into the steam. "Aaaaah," he breathes. "Better. Unless… you want me to go?"

"No," Holly says, standing and reaching for her coat, "it's me that has to get going. I have a briefcase full of reports to go over back at the hotel."

John remembers that, too. Holly on the bed, spreadsheets and graphs and business proposals spread out over the comforter, Holly's furrowed brow as she worked, the distraction in her voice when she spoke to him. It got so Holly slept with her reports more than she did with him. 

He shakes his head. That was then, and his now is very different. "You said you wanted to talk to me about Jack," he reminds her.

"Of course," she says. "Well. John. I'm happy to tell you that Jack was finally accepted into the exchange student program." His eyes must widen – the last he'd heard, Jack hadn't made the cut – because she bobs her head and laughs. "One of the kids had to drop out, so Jack got the call for the second semester. He leaves for Paris a week Wednesday."

"Holy shit," he says. "Good for him, Hol."

"We're having a bon voyage party for him on Sunday," she continues. "He'd love it if you could make it."

John scrubs a hand over his jaw. "Jesus, Holly, there's no fucking way. I'm going to be up to my ass in this Hoon thing. I got depositions, reports in goddamn triplicate. The department needs me here."

"Your son needs you, too."

John feels his jaw clenching, tries to will himself to relax. It's the old argument, the one that never ended. He can still hear her voice in his ear, down those long distance phone lines of years past: he's not there enough for the kids, they need _him_ not just his support cheque. And he knows he was never going to win a Father of the Year award, but he tried, damnit. And sometimes Holly didn't make it easy. 

"I can't, Holly," he says. "Tell him I'll call him, all right?"

He finds Matt still in the kitchen, leaning against the counter and sipping at his coffee, when he gets back from escorting Holly to her rental car. He rubs his hands together, reaches for his mug, and eyes Matt over the rim.

"Do we need to talk about this?" he asks warily.

Matt lifts one eloquent shoulder. "Not really," he says. 

John can see the wheels turning in the kid's head, though, all the questions that he wants to ask about Holly, about Holly-and-John, whirling through that super-smart noggin. He's just glad that Matt's dropping it for now. 

"Are you sure you can't get time off to go see Jack?"

John can just picture the look on Scalvino's face if he asked to take personal days right now. "I'm sure," he says shortly.

"But—"

"Matthew," John says. "Don't start."

Matt holds up a hand in surrender, sets his empty mug down on the counter and crosses the room. "Fine," he says. When he brushes that long, lithe body against him, John forgets all about Hoon and Jack and Holly and the damn department; when Matt's warm lips press against his cool neck, John lets the coffee mug clatter to the table and does what he's wanted to do since Matt walked in the room. He finds Matt's shirt hems and pushes past the layers of clothing, splays his hands on the warm smooth skin of Matt's back.

"Jesus," Matt says, jerking against him, "you're freezing."

"Guess you'll just have to warm me up," John says.

 

**Tuesday**

It starts off like a typical Tuesday morning. Matt ignores John the first eight hundred and seventy five times that John tells him it's time to get up, and finally hauls his ass out of bed only because John strips away the covers and threatens to douse him with the hose if he doesn't get the fuck up. In the hazy state of his still sleep-foggy brain he's still aware that the garden hose is currently buried under a foot of snow in the back yard, but he also knows that this is John McClane he's dealing with. He knows better than to risk it. And anyway, John makes it up to him later in the shower with a long, slow, mutual hand-job session that lasts until the water turns lukewarm and they're both wrinkly-skinned and weak-kneed.

They eat breakfast in the kitchen, Matt occasionally stealing bites of John's whole wheat toast, John making faces when Matt makes him try Cocoa Pebbles and Matt pretending not to notice when John sneaks three more spoonfuls. John wins the toss so they listen to Fogerty on the drive to the precinct, and they part in the foyer with a nod and a shoulder bump and John's promise to meet Matt for lunch. 

It's when Matt pushes through the wide glass double doors into the cyber division that things start to get weird.

For one thing, the place is crowded. Usually there's not much more than the hum of the computers and the muted voices of the techs talking about their latest cases, or more likely their latest World of Warcraft scores. But today there's some kind of tour, a bunch of lab geeks in pale blue jackets huddled like baby robins around Karposki's desk and chattering excitedly. The hard plastic chairs in the vestibule are all full, too. Matt sees a woman with a baby, two nervous looking men, a pretty Asian woman with long dark hair, some dude that looks like a file clerk – most of them talking loudly, their voices filtering through the glass. 

When he's shucked his bag and coat and dropped into his chair and hears Mooney's running his _Worst of Craptastic 80's Power Ballads_ playlist, he thinks longingly of his perfect little office set-up in John's spare room, and sighs. He steeples his hands, closes his eyes briefly and tries to ignore the distractions. The modifications he made to the sound wave distribution spectrum got John his Hoon arrest, but he's pretty sure he can tweak the code just a little more, get him wider access the next time he needs to use it. A couple of hours of that and then he'll be sitting across from John at Mendes, and by the afternoon he'll be back in his own office. He can make it.

"Hey," Mooney says. He slides his chair back so that he can see around the dirty fabric partition, juts his chin in the direction of the lab geeks. "Some breakthrough in the McPhalen investigation."

"The multiple homicide?"

Mooney raises a colourless brow, curls his lip at Karposki's back. "That dumbass couldn't find a microkernel in his OS," he says. "Ten to one this is all some shuck and jive, and his ass is on the pavement by the end of the week."

Matt shrugs – he cares as much about office politics as he does, oh, reality television – and pulls his keyboard closer. He squares his shoulders as if that will help to block out the sound of Def Leppard wailing about love bites and concentrates on the code. Before long he's deep into the variations of sound waves and the ways he can see to apply them, not actually aware that he's grinning, and certainly not aware of the rise in the noise level when the door opens. The first indication he has that the day has just moved from average weird into deeply weird is when the gunshots are fired into the ceiling.

"Ohhhhh shit," Matt breathes out. 

On some level he's aware of people screaming, shouted voices, the rattle of more gunfire. But he's been here before – his knee aches every goddamn morning to prove it – and he keeps his cool, rattling off an email to John and managing a couple more things before Mooney is grabbing at his elbow and pulling him to the floor. He lands with an mumbled _oof_ , scrambles beneath the desk and peers around the edge while pulling out his cell phone.

"Everyone will stay calm," the shooter calls out. "No one will be hurt if everyone stays calm and our demands are met."

"Yeah," Mooney mutters from beside him, "why don't I believe him?"

Matt flips open his phone, tries to keep one eye on the proceedings while he works. The shooter is pacing now, his long dark ponytail swishing across his back as he moves, and Matt sees the discarded florists box on the floor, the spilled flowers. His mind flashes back to the Terminator, Arnie pulling a gun from the middle of those damn roses. Sometimes the classics still work. Too bad this fucker doesn't know that 1PP has its own version of Robocop. 

"One of you will contact Officer John McClane," the shooter says. "Once Officer McClane has been delivered to us, along with the wrongfully imprisoned Jeon-Hoon, you will be set free."

"It's Detective, asshole," Matt mutters without looking up from his phone.

He freezes, however, when the gun barrel presses into his cheekbone. 

"What," the shooter says, "do you think you're doing?"

Matt looks up, tries a shaky grin. "Who, me? I'm just… ordering a pizza, got a little hungry—"

The shooter removes the weapon, eyes him. "You think you are funny?"

"Usually," Matt says. 

"Maybe Officer McClane will not wish to cooperate with us. Maybe we will need to hurt a hostage to convince him. Maybe," the shooter says, "it will not be so funny when your brains are leaking onto the floor."

"Oh, hey," Matt says, "you don't want to do that, man. Blood's so hard to get out of the carpet and… okay, okay," he says when the gun barrel returns to gouge into his cheek. "I get you, I'm cooperating here, okay? No funny business, no shenanigans, I swear."

For a long moment he thinks the shooter might take him out anyway, releases a shaky breath when the long barrel of the shotgun is pulled away. The shooter reaches out instead, long fingers plucking the phone from his hand, and lets it drop the floor before lifting his boot and sending it crashing down onto the cell. When the thing spatters into a dozen electronic pieces, Matt closes his eyes.

  


* * *  


"How did he get in there anyway?" John rages.

"It's cyber division," Connie says, "Land of the geeks. There's no metal detectors on that floor!"

"Yeah? And how did he get past the metal detectors on the main floor, huh?"

"He must have had a key-card," Lambert says. "Who gives a fuck? The main thing is getting up there—"

"He'll be watching the security cams," Ortega starts.

"I can make it up the elevator shaft—"

"Nobody's going up the elevator shaft, John!" Scalvino says. "Everybody, listen up! We've got two shooters and a shitload of unarmed hostages, some of them civilian! I want workable plans here, people!"

John's phone beeps.

* * *  


"I never thought I'd die like this, Farrell," Mooney murmurs.

"Jesus," Matt says. "You're not going to die, okay? Nobody's going to die."

"I always thought I'd get married, have a couple of brats. Maybe get a dog." He smiles wistfully. "Maybe a german shepherd. I was always partial to german shepherds."

"Holy fuck, Mooney," Matt hisses, "you're not going to die, all right? Now give me your cell phone."

Mooney blinks. "What?"

Matt takes a careful look around the edge of the desk. The shooter is pacing, one eye on the phone where John is due to call in at any minute, and his accomplice – the overweight file clerk from the vestibule – is keeping a wary eye on all the hostages. Matt takes a breath before stealing a glance at the oversized clock above the door. It's not optimal, but it's gotta be now.

"Listen to me, Mooney," he says. "You're going to live a long, happy life. You can marry that chick at the Shop N Save that you're always drooling over if you ever get the fucking balls to ask her on a date, and she can pop out a couple of snot-nosed kids, and you and your wife and your fucking german shepherd can ride off into the sunset and have a goddamn menage a trois for all I fucking care. But none of that is going to happen unless you _give me your goddamn phone_!"

Matt's seen visual representations of a person's jaw "hitting the carpet" after some startling revelation in a graphic novel. But he's never seen it in real life until he looks at Mooney's face. He reaches slowly into his pocket and withdraws the cell phone, his hand shaking as he hands it over.

"Thank you," Matt breathes out. He snatches a cautious look over to the shooters before flipping it open, scanning quickly through the system. It's not as good as his phone – as his phone _was_ , he amends – but it'll do. His fingers fly over the keys, setting up the program. And then he closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and says a little mental prayer.

"They're still not looking," Mooney says softly. "Is there anything else I can do?"

Matt's lip quirk. Maybe Mooney can grow some balls after all. 

"Yeah," Matt says just before he hits the button. "Pray that everybody has their speakers on."

* * *

"You sure about this, John?" Ortega asks.

"Nope."

"That's comforting," Connie drawls.

* * *

Nothing happens at first. Matt has the sickening, dizzying feeling that he fucked up, messed up a line of code somewhere… and then he feels it. It starts as a prickling in his ears, the mental equivalent of nails on a chalkboard, and within seconds it increases in intensity, builds and crashes like waves in his head, the ultrasonic pulse battering in his brain. There's no noise, yet he still can't hear a sound when the doors crash in, when John and his team stalk through the broken glass.

At some point he's fallen over, palms pressed to his ears in a vain attempt to keep out the sound that's not sound, and he watches from his prone position as John stalks to the terrorists writhing on the floor, watches as they're disarmed and someone – he thinks it might be Lambert – pulls out the cuffs.

He's dizzy, thinks his nose might be bleeding, but he manages to drag one hand toward the phone, shakily press down on the button that will end the program.

Then John is dragging the ear protection from his own ears and pulling him to his feet. John's hands everywhere, touching him, making sure he's okay. John talking though Matt can't understand a word he's saying, and John's lips pressing against his hair, his cheek, the underside of his jaw. John's thumb wiping away the thread of blood from his nose. He takes a breath, then another, lets himself lean on John, his hands clenching at the front of John's shirt, their foreheads touching. He breathes John's air. 

There's a flash of light, Lambert sounding like he's at the end of a wind tunnel, bellowing at someone to get the fuck out. 

Matt opens his jaw wide, feels his ears pop and real sound come rushing back in. 

"Jesus Christ, Matthew," John says.

"Okay. I'm okay," Matt says. He manages a wobbly grin, huffs out a shaky laugh. "Heyyyy, it worked."

"It worked," John says, pressing another quick kiss to his temple before letting him go. "Goddamn genius."

"You're _lucky_ I'm a goddamn genius," is all Matt gets out before his attention is diverted by the tall, gangly kid at the door. 

The kid looks askance at the blood and broken glass, shrugs and lifts his burden high in the air. "Yeah, okay," he calls out, "somebody order pizza?"

"That'd be me," Matt says. 

He pulls away from John and reaches for his wallet, and actually manages three steps toward the kid before he bends at the waist and loses his breakfast on the grey industrial carpet.

  
  
**Wednesday**   
  


The car is blessedly silent on the drive to work. Not that he doesn't enjoy some tunes, but the only reason he flips with Matt for music privileges on the mornings they drive in together is so that he doesn't have to listen to some woman screeching like a cat in pain during the drive to the precinct. And not that John doesn't also enjoy Matt's enthusiasm, his passion. Most of the time he likes listening to Matt's nonstop chatter, and when he doesn't? The best way to shut him involves a lot of tongue, and he likes _that_ , too. But there's something to be said for a relaxing drive to clear his head before he dives into the chaos of work. 

The murmurs start as soon as John gets to the front doors.

The receptionist at the security desk grins cheekily at him as he passes her station. The uniform manning the key-card door punches him playfully on the arm. Stankowski from Vice wiggles his eyebrows as he gets out of the elevator.

John scrubs his hand over his head as he makes the short walk from the elevator to the JTTF offices. It doesn't take a goddamn detective to figure out that something's up, and he's going to find out exactly what as soon as he gets to his desk.

He chooses to consider the catcalls, wolf whistles, and loudly shouted innuendo that greet him as soon as he pushes open the door as more 'clues'.

John brushes the snow from his coat before holding up a hand, waits for the final taunt to fade. "All right," he calls out, "what the fuck?"

"Ohhhh ho," Lambert says. "He must not have seen it yet!"

Ortega sidles up to him, wiggles his tongue. "You're in for a treat, McClane."

"Go fuck yourself, Ortega," John says easily as he strolls to his desk. 

"Don't let them bother you," Kowalski shouts. "I think it's adorable."

When John finds the newspaper propped up on his desk and the catcalls reach a fevered pitch, he closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. "Ohhhh fuck," he says.

* * *

John does his best to spend most of the day outside the office, but there's only so much legwork he can do and only so many places he can find to spread out and do his paperwork. When he gets kicked out of the fifth floor locker room – turns out the Homicide department takes offense to him pacing and muttering next to their showers –he ends up back in the bullpen, striding through the door just in time to see Matt leaving Scalvino's office.

He stops midway across the room, inclines his head in Matt's direction. "Hey."

"Heyyyy," Matt says. He glances over his shoulder, shrugs and shakes his hair out of his eyes. "I was just… I thought you were out doing depositions all day."

"Postponed."

"Okay. Is it too late for lunch?"

John glances at the clock. "Only by about three hours, bottomless pit. What the hell are you doing here, anyway?"

Matt waves a hand in the general direction of Scalvino's office. "Meeting. Yeah. After the whole ear bleeding thing yesterday, he wanted to make sure I wasn't planning any more 'unspecified modifications' to the Hoon code."

John grunts. "Those 'unspecified modifications' might have saved a lot of lives."

"Yeah? Well, tell Scalvino that." He leans a little closer, drops his voice. "Rumour has it that a couple of the civvies are already talking lawsuit."

"Great."

"Yeah, well." Matt lifts his shoulders in a _what can you do_ motion, cocks his head. "Are you okay? You're never a man of many words, McClane, but you're unusually taciturn this afternoon." 

"I take it you haven't seen today's Times," John says drily.

"No. What, did the Yankees lose or something?"

John rubs the bridge of his nose. Sometimes he just can't tell if the kid is pulling his leg, but to be on the safe side… 

"That's baseball," he says wearily. "It's football and hockey season." He jerks his head, leads Matt toward his desk and pulls open the top drawer. The newspaper flops onto the desk with a thump that seems much too loud in the room. "And I'm talking about _this_."

Matt eyes him curiously, but he lifts up the paper.

The article is about the attempted hostage taking in cyber division, but it's the photo – that takes up half the page above the fold – that dominates the page. John's hand is cupped at the nape of Matt's neck, his fingers curling in the strands. Matt's hand is fisted in John's shirt. Their foreheads brush, and they are staring into each other's eyes, lips parted. The fact that some joker in the bullpen took the time to encircle the photo in a giant red heart just adds the finishing touch. The shade of the lipstick points a definite accusatory finger to Martinez.

"Huh," Matt says. He lets the paper drop back to the desk. "It's a good photo. Nice composition."

John shakes his head. "Nice composition? That's all you have to fucking say?"

"Look man, I'm just glad they didn't print the one of me puking my guts out." He looks up and grins. "Hey, I guess that was the flash that went off yesterday."

"Gee, ya think?" John mutters.

"What, you're not…? Are you… embarrassed, John?"

"I'm not embarrassed."

"Good, because it's not like we've made this a big secret or anything—"

"No—"

"… and there was that time that Kowalski caught us in the corridor outside the evidence locker, and if that didn't bother you—"

"Jesus, kid."

"… then seriously, John, _everyone_ already knew, and it's sure as fuck not something that _I'm_ embarrassed about—"

John grabs hold of Matt's arms before they can start their usual routine of flailing and flapping, leans him into the desk. "I'm not embarrassed, all right? I just don't like having my private life splashed on the front page of the goddamn newspaper. And," he adds quickly before Matt can interrupt, "I would say that whether I was seeing you or a woman or a fucking monkey, all right?"

Matt huffs out a breath, but he relaxes under John's restraints, raises a bushy brow. "Are you equating me with a monkey?"

"If the eyebrow fits…"

"Hey!"

John can't help it if his lips twitch. "And you do make those weird noises," he points out.

"You _make_ me make them," Matt says, "when you do that thing with your tongue."

John's "Jesus, kid," has a whole different timbre to it this time, and when he closes the distance between them to brush his lips chastely against Matt's, he finds that he can easily ignore the catcalls. 

"Thanks for putting up with me," he says when they part. 

"It's pretty easy," Matt says. "And hey, you know? If you don't want your face plastered on all the papers, you should probably stop being a superhero."

"Does that mean I have to get rid of my costume?"

Matt grins. "You can ditch the tights," he says, wiggling his eyebrows, "but you have to keep the utility belt."

  
**Thursday**  
  


On Thursday, John discovers that _everyone_ didn't exactly know about his relationship with Matt Farrell.

"Detective McClane?"

John makes a notation along the right margin of the wiretap transcript, doesn't bother to look up. "You got him," he says.

"I was wondering if we might have a few words."

John lays down his pen, glances up at the stranger. Tall, well-dressed, expensive haircut, tie that probably costs more than he makes in a week. Too unselfconsciously smooth for a Fed, and too passive for a reporter. His money'd be on IA if it wasn't for the tie. By process of elimination, that only leaves lawyer. 

And John likes lawyers about as much as he likes terrorists.

"See Captain Scalvino, third door on the right," he says shortly before returning to his paperwork.

"Excuse me?"

John sighs. "The attack on the cyber division yesterday, the use of the ultrasonic pulse to disarm the perpetrators. Captain Scalvino is handling all inquiries. Third door on the right."

When the stranger just looks at him blankly, John raises a brow. "That _is_ what this is regarding," he says.

"Not exactly."

"Not exactly," John repeats. "Then how about you fill me in on what it is regarding. Exactly."

"Well, Detective McClane," the stranger says, "I would say this is regarding the fact that you appear to be sleeping with my son."

Only the years he's put in with the shield enable John to keep a neutral expression. He raises his chin, gestures with one hand toward the interrogation room. "Maybe," he says, "we better take this somewhere private."

* * *

The bullpen coffee tastes like the by-product of nuclear waste, but John fetches them both a cup anyway, sets the steaming styrofoam down next to the stranger's elbow.

Daniel Farrell. Matt's father.

Jeeeeeeeeeeeesus.

Daniel takes a seat and warms his hands on the cup but – wisely, John thinks – doesn't take a sip. He raises his eyes to John's instead. "I thought that given the… circumstances… we should become acquainted," he begins.

John leans a hip against the table, crosses his arms at this chest. When he speaks, there is more belligerence in his tone than he expects. "You didn't have to wait until we made the front page to do that. I'm not exactly unlisted. You were welcome to get in touch any time."

"And I would have," Daniel says, "had I been aware that you existed." 

John looks up sharply. "You didn't know about Matt… about his…" 

John's never been fond of labels. He has no idea how to put it. All he knows is how Matt makes him feel, how if he's away from him for too long he starts to feel twitchy, how he just can't sleep anymore unless Matt is sprawled out on the bed beside him hogging all the covers. How he'll detour out of his way on the ride home to spend three dollars on a low-fat half-caf latte with extra sprinkles just because Matt likes it, or spend a Saturday afternoon reading a comic book – and Matt can call it a graphic _novel_ all he wants, it's got cartoons and word bubbles, it's a goddamn comic book – because it makes Matt happy. How this is the first time he's felt content in so long that at first he didn't even recognize _happiness_ for what it was.

Daniel smiles. "Oh, _that_. Yes, of course we did. We've known about Matthew since he was twelve. His mother was putting away some things in his room and came across a stack of _Playgirls_ buried at the bottom of his desk drawer. Matthew's sister Elizabeth was seventeen at the time, so we assumed… well, his mother and I gave Elizabeth holy hell for hiding her secret stash in her baby brother's room. Matthew heard us and came clean about the whole thing." 

"Sounds like Matt," John says. He lets out a breath, drops into one of the chairs. 

"The article implies that the two of you are… seeing each other. I assume by your reaction that the article is correct."

"Ohhh, the article is correct. I assumed you knew." He quirks a grin that quickly becomes a grimace when he swallows down some of the coffee, pushes the mug away. "Some detective."

"Just like his inability to let someone else take the blame for his misdeeds, Matthew also has a… skill for evasiveness," Daniel says.

"You can say that again," John mutters. 

He realizes suddenly that the little he knows about Matt's family could fit on the back of a matchbook with room to spare. How whenever he asked Matt would change the subject, or wave it off with a comment about two point five kids and a dog, or do something wicked with his fingers or his tongue that would make John forget all about the line of questioning that he was pursuing. If he'd thought of it again at all, he'd figured that Matt's family didn't approve of his sexuality, that eventually Matt would be ready to tell him about it.

He leans back on the chair. "So you were okay with Matt being…"

"Bisexual?" Daniel supplies. "Well, we were a little thrown at first. What parent wouldn’t be? But yes, we did our best to support him. He brought several girlfriends home during high school. A couple of boyfriends, too. They were all welcome in our home."

John scrubs a hand across his jaw. Over the course of the last six months – since that night in August when he finally admitted to himself that the teasing camaraderie he'd built up with Matt was more than friendship, that he was coming up with excuses to touch him, that sitting on the edge of his bed in the spare room at night and smoothing a hand through his hair while he slept in order to chase away the dreams felt like nothing _paternal_ , that the kid awoke a need in him that was constant and unrelenting and ferocious – he'd gotten used to the idea that he was the only one with a history. Not just baggage but a whole overflowing closet, years and years of a time-without-Matt. 

It comes as a surprise to him to discover that Matt has a history, too. A family that supported him when they found he liked boys as much as he liked girls. Dates brought home to meet the parents. A life-without-John that he had no idea existed.

But John is also a cop, and sometimes he thinks he was born cynical. He raises his eyes, cocks a brow. "No offence, Mr. Farrell, but if things were so peaches and cream at home, why doesn't Matt ever see you? Talk about you? Have anything at all to do with you?"

Daniel spreads his arms. "He's very… headstrong, is Matthew. He made some bad decisions, got into some trouble with the law. He… rebelled, Detective. And… I do believe he's embarrassed of us. I'm an attorney, my wife is a pediatrician. We have a double car garage and a time share in the Caribbean. We embody all the crass capitalism that Matthew came to hate."

John nods. "You sure as hell talk like a lawyer."

"Hazard of the trade, I'm afraid," Daniel says with a smile. "Sometimes I think Matthew was born at the wrong time. He would have fit in very well in the '60's."

"He's sure as hell got the hair for it," John says wryly.

"But now that he's dating a police officer, that all seems to have changed," Daniel says. He leans back in his own chair, eyes John thoughtfully. "Though I must be honest with you, Detective. When we saw the photo in the paper..." He shakes his head. "I can't say that we were thrilled with the idea of Matthew dating someone old enough to be his father."

John knows – _knows_ , beyond a shadow of a doubt – that if Lucy showed up with an old man on her arm, John would deck him, then lock Lucy in her room until she was thirty.

At least he'd try. Lucy's right hook is as good as her mother's.

But understanding where Daniel Farrell is coming from doesn't do jack squat about the way he _feels_ about Matt, or the way Matt feels about him. There is no way he's giving that up. Not ever. He wants Matt to have a good relationship with his family, but if it means he loses him in the process? John has a problem with that. If that makes him a selfish asshole, so be it. He's been called worse.

John leans forward in the chair, meets Daniel's eyes. "Look," he says. "If you had told me a year ago that I'd be involved with someone like Matt, I'd have said you were swilling turpentine and then hauled you off to the closest shrink," John says. "This isn't anything I planned, and it sure as fuck isn't anything I expected. All I can promise you is that I care for him. I love him. I will never hurt him."

Daniel watches him for a long moment, then nods. "I'm a good judge of character, Detective. I have to be, in my profession, just as you do in yours. You seem to be an honest man. And if even half of the exploits they've printed about you are true, you're also a good man. That means a lot in my book."

"I appreciate that, Mr. Farrell."

"I'd like to get to know you better," Daniel continues. When he hesitates, John sees the first crack in the smooth courtroom façade, sees the nervous twitch in his eyes that reveals him as an anxious husband, a concerned father, as human. 

"My wife Wendy and I were hoping that you and Matthew could come to dinner next week," Daniel finally says. "We haven't seen Matthew in… a long time, and we'd like to… we'd like to reconnect with our son."

"That'll have to be up to Matt," John says.

"Of course." Daniel nods as he digs into his wallet to pull out a small embossed card. "My personal information is on the back," he says as he hands it over. "If you could talk to Matthew, and then call. Or have him call. Anytime is fine, we can rearrange our schedule."

"I'll let you know, Mr. Farrell," John says. He reaches out a hand. "And under the circumstances, I think you oughtta be calling me John."

"Thank you, John." the other man says as he takes the hand in a firm grip. "And please, call me Daniel. Or Dan, whichever you prefer." He gathers up his expensive overcoat, hesitates in the doorway and flashes a wide grin. Unlike the polite smiles that peppered the rest of the conversation, this one is full and open, and for the first time John can see Matt in him.

"Just one thing," Daniel says around that grin. "Don't ever call me Dad."

  
**Friday**  
  


Matt glances around the restaurant as the waitress leads them to their table. Low lightning, linen tablecloths, leather-bound menus – he definitely feels underdressed in his grubby jeans and faded linux tee layered under a scruffy plaid overshirt. Granted, it's not as high end as the place John took him when he formally asked him to move in, even though at that point most of Matt's stuff had already migrated to John's place and he was only visiting his little one-room walk-up once a week to pick up his mail. But it's still nicer than the usual scuffed table and ten beers on tap joints that he and John normally frequent, which is what he expected when he suggested this night out after a really, _really_ long week.

And that just makes him wonder what exactly John McClane is up to.

As it turns out, it takes John three courses and half a piece of apple crumble to come out with it.

"Dinner," Matt says flatly.

"Yes."

"Dinner with my _parents_."

"That's what I just said."

"Yeah, like that's gonna happen," Matt scoffs. He looks down at his half-eaten pie, sets the fork on the plate and glances around for the waitress. "We should head back if you want to make it home in time for kick-off."

John blinks. "That's it?"

Matt catches the blonde's eye and indicates their need for the bill, flick his eyes back to John's. "What did you expect me to say?"

"I don't know," John admits.

"Well then?"

"I expected you to use many, many words to say it," John says.

"Okay," Matt says with a laugh, sits up straighter. "You want me to flip out, get all worked up? Is that it?"

"I didn't say that."

"Then what are you saying? Because seriously, John, I have no idea."

Instead of answering the question, John says, "Your parents didn't know about us."

"Nope," Matt says.

"And you don't think that's strange."

"Nope," Matt says.

"Jesus Christ, kid," John grunts out. "Stop this fucking one word shit and talk to me."

"We _are_ talking!" When John just arches a brow, Matt flops back in his chair. There are eons of meaning to John's eyebrow arches, layers upon layers of subtlety that it would take decades to explore, but he knows that when _this_ particular arch comes out of the arsenal it's either time for a rambling monologue that masks his strategic retreat to his office, or a quick-and-dirty launch across the table to distract John from the whole line of questioning. If they were at Colsentino's or one of their other regular haunts he might risk the frontal attack, but he has a feeling the suit and tie crowd here might frown on him sticking his tongue down John's throat. "Look," he says instead, trying for simple and straightforward, "I just don't have any interest whatsoever in spending time with my parents. Full stop. End of story. Nothing to see here, move along folks."

The eyebrow loses a bit of its force when John leans back in his own chair. "Why?"

"Why?" Matt repeats. "You _met_ them and you have to ask me that?"

"I only met your old m… your father."

"My old father?" Matt says cheekily. If straightforward doesn't work, it's always good to give humour a try. "As opposed to my newly minted father from the factory in Scranton? Aaaand there goes the brow again, full throttle." When John just stares at him, Matt sighs. "If you met my dad, then you know what he's like. Trust me, they're both like that. Don’t get me wrong, they're… they're good people, but come on, total Stepford vibe. They have the perfect careers, the perfect house, the perfect car, social life, country home. And the only thing they needed with all that?"

"The perfect kids."

"Bingo, got it in one. Give the man a prize," Matt says, and if it sounds more bitter than he intended, so be it. He feels his bangs lift when he huffs out a breath, scrapes his fingers through his hair. "I couldn't just get an 87 on a test and call it good, it had to be a 97. 'This is affecting your college placements, Matthew'," he imitates his dad's clipped tones before dropping back to his regular voice, meeting John's eyes. "I was fourteen! They were all nice when I brought home Rick Felton, but they would've been a hell of a lot happier if it'd been Dave Murray, 'cause _his_ father was on the faculty at Yale. Debate club and trombone lessons, rah rah rah, live up to your potential, be the best you can fucking be, except it doesn't really matter what you do because it'll never really be good enough."

John is silent for a long moment. Then he says, "I knew there'd be a lot more words."

Matt feels his lips quirk. At some point in his running dialogue he's sat up straight, his shoulders tense and his neck stiff, and when John takes his hand across the table he feels some of the sudden thrumming energy in his body ease away. "After a while it just got so I wanted to…"

"Be bad?" John suggests.

Matt cocks his head. "Maybe. I mean, I'm not saying the shit I got into was their fault, it was my stupid fucking decision to boost those cars… just for the joyride," he adds hastily when John's lips thin. He rubs a thumb against John's hand, waits for the answering squeeze before continuing, even though he has the idea that they're going to be coming back to _that_ little revelation soon in the coming weeks. "And then when I got better on the computer I started hacking into other people's systems, corporations, government shit, because I _had_ to, it's really the only way to learn, and I was good at it, and then I was _great_ at it, and it was something that didn't fit in that perfect Stepford world and just…" He shrugs. "I don't fit there. There's a reason why my sister dyed her hair purple and moved to Rome, why neither of go home for holidays or Christmas. It's exhausting to live with that much pressure." 

"All right," John says after a moment. "You don't wanna go, we won't go."

"Yeaaaah," Matt huffs out. "Pretty clear I don't want to go."

"Okay," John says. When the waitress appears with their bill, John releases his hand and scoops it off the table, has his credit card tucked into the leather folder before Matt can even reach for his wallet. He is reaching around for his coat instead when John says, "I just want to say one thing."

Matt tries to stifle a sigh, turns around to see John slipping into his leather jacket. "John—" he starts.

"I know what it's like to fuck up with your kids, all right? I am the _patron saint_ of fucking up with your kids. You lay awake at night, wishing you could go back in time to fix it, go back and say all the shit you didn't say and unsay all the stupid shit that came outta your mouth when you had a bad day because some wet behind the ears rookie fucked up the chain of evidence and the perp you spent five months building a case for got off, or because you spent the last seventy-two hours awake in your car on surveillance. Or because for a while you liked spending your time with Jim Beam and Johnnie Walker more than you did with Jack and Lucy."

"That's not… you weren't…"

"I was," John says. "I'm not proud of it. It ain't fun, kid, sitting there night after night remembering all the things you should have done and all the things you did that just fucked everything up even more. To know that you failed." John stops, shakes his head. "To have your kids grow up and want nothing to do with you."

"That's not true. Lucy and Jack—"

"Things have gotten better," John concedes. "Because I kept trying. Because Lucy and Jack let me."

Matt slumps back in his chair. "Wow. Okay, seriously. You really know how to lay down the subtle guilt trip, don't you, McClane?"

"That's not what I'm going for here at all, Matty, and you know it," John says. "All I'm asking is for you to think about it. We don't have to see them next week or next month or next year. You think about it and you want your parents to be persona non grata for the rest of your natural life, I will stand with you on that. Try to see both sides, then make your call. Either way, I got your back."

By the time the waitress returns with their receipt, Matt has shrugged into his coat and gloves and John is wrapping a thin scarf around his neck, his one concession to the sub-zeros of a New York winter. Matt waits until John has slipped his wallet back into his pocket before touching him on the arm. 

"I'll think about it," he says. 

"S'all I ask," John answers.

* * *

Matt is uncharacteristically quiet on the drive home, not even looking particularly happy when John agrees to let him put on his Screeching Cat In Heat music, and also not rising to the bait when John points out what an incredible sacrifice he and his eardrums are making. He's gotten used to Matt's nonstop running commentary, finds the sound of his voice soothing as the tires swish through the wet snow, and the lack of it is almost enough to make John regret having instigated the big family drama discussion in the first place.

Matt's brow is furrowed, his lips pursed. John should have known. When that supersmart brain goes into high gear, it goes from zero to a hundred in about six seconds and doesn't let up until the equation is solved. But family issues aren't like math problems, and he has no intention of letting the kid dwell. 

He parks in the driveway and lets Matt walk ahead of him up the sidewalk, reaches out to catch his elbow as he mounts the steps. "You really play the trombone?" he asks.

"What? No!" Matt says, turning and pausing on the porch. "I was debate club, chess club. Drama club for a while. My breakthrough role was as the Third Villager in the tenth grade production of _Damon and Pythius_. Of course, Dad thought I should have played Dionysius." Matt shakes his head, visibly pushing the thought aside. "Anyway. The trombone was Elizabeth. Please, John, do these lips look like they could blow on a… you know what, never mind."

"Oh, they look like they could blow, all right," John says, taking the last step and tugging Matt against his chest, earning a genuine smile for his effort. 

"I just walked right into that one, didn't I, McClane?"

John doesn't bother to answer, just wraps his hand beneath the long hair at the nape of Matt's neck. The kid shivers, not entirely from the press of John's cold fingers on his warm skin, and then John's tongue is buried in the warm, wet heat of his mouth and neither of them think about anything for a good long minute.

"Down, boy," Matt says with a laugh when their lips part, pushing on his chest. Matt could push 'til the sun comes up and he wouldn't get anywhere John wouldn't want him to be, but since where John really wants to be is deep inside him within the next ten minutes, he relents and lets Matt push him away. For now. 

"You should probably tell me the other thing that's on your mind before we go inside," Matt continues.

John lifts a brow. Trust the kid to know that something else was up. "What do you think you are, a genius or something like that?"

"Something like that," Matt says. "So spill." He leans his shoulder into John's before stepping back, standing in the fall of the porch light. Seeing him like that, _glowing_ like that, it's all John can do not to fling the front door open and throw him down on the hallway runner in a tangle of limbs and…

Matt is waiting expectantly, so John leans against the railing, crosses his arms at his chest. "What did you really go to see Scalvino about on Wednesday?"

"The programming, I told you," Matt says. 

"Kid, do I gotta go through that whole cops and lying thing again?"

"It's the truth!" Matt protests. 

John doesn't say a word. He's been doing interrogations for a lot of years, and Matt's sins of omission are as easy to catch as his out-and-out lies. He knows he only has to stay quiet for another few seconds and Matt will crack. Five, four, three, two…

"Aaaaand…" Matt says with a sigh, "I might have asked him if the department could give a few days off next week so you could go to Jack's bon voyage party."

John shakes his head. Whatever he'd been expecting, it wasn't that. 

"And you were right, okay?" Matt continues. "He said No. Actually, he said 'Are you out of your fucking mind, Farrell? Get your skinny ass out of my office.' Scalvino might look like a big dumb hound dog, but the dude doesn't mince words, does he?"

John lifts a shoulder, grateful that Matt has turned away to dig his key out of his pocket and shove the door open and therefore can't see the look on his face. He knew the answer would be no, of course he knew, but that didn't stop the hope from blooming quickly in his chest, or the sense of crushing loss when the confirmation of the No came from Matt's lips. He squares his shoulders, pushes off from the railing and claps a hand onto Matt's shoulder. "Thanks for trying, kid," he says. "Could've told you not to waste your breath."

"Yeah, well," Matt says as he takes a step back onto the porch, gestures with his chin for John to step inside the house. "He wouldn't let you go to California. So, I did the next best thing."

"Eh?"

The hallway light is on, but the figure standing in the archway to the living room is wreathed in shadows. John squints to see in the gloom, then sucks in a shaking breath when the figure moves.

"Hi, Dad," Jack says.

**  
Saturday   
**   


The clanging of dishes in the kitchen wakes John.

His first thought – something along the lines of _goddamn fucking kid can't crack an egg without waking the whole neighbourhood_ – is belied when he stretches out an arm and his knuckles flop against Matt's back. When Matt grunts in response, John frowns. His brain cells are not quite working at full capacity yet, and his heart rate speeds up for a good five seconds – _Matt here, noises from kitchen, who the fuck is in my goddamn house_ – before he remembers the events of the night before. 

His son is here. Here, in his house, rattling pots and pans in his kitchen at – he rises onto one shoulder to glance at the alarm clock – at nine fucking a.m. Never mind that John didn't stumble to his bed until sometime after four, and Matt and Jack stayed up even longer, the murmured sound of their voices lulling him to sleep.

He remembers taking two long strides into the hallway, wrapping Jack in a bear hug, how the kid was stiff in his arms for the space of a few heartbeats before he laughed and hugged back and clapped him on the back; remembers downing a couple of beers and Jack's smile and vowing not to fuck this up. And he thinks maybe Jack made the same internal vow, because everything was easy and good and right and at one point he'd made an excuse and escaped to the kitchen and stood with his hands clenching the counter, breathing deep and forcing back the swell of emotion that threatened to overspill. 

Matt did that. Matt made that happen. 

When John gets introspective, he usually thinks of his life as a series of colossal fuck-ups mitigated by the occasional good deed that probably don't do much to tip the karmic scales back in his favour. So he really has no idea what he did to deserve someone like Matthew Farrell. Maybe the guy upstairs is happier with him than he thought.

In a moment he'll get up, shuffle down the hall and splash some water on his face, go to the kitchen and help his son make breakfast. But now he shifts onto his side, slides his hand slowly up Matt's spine. The kid's head is buried in his pillow, most of his face curtained by that shaggy hair. He lips are parted just slightly, his breathing deep and even. 

Yeah. Can't have that. 

He wraps a hand around the curve of Matt's shoulder, gives him a little shake. "Hey," he says.

The single eye that John can see flutters once, and Matt's brow furrows just slightly before smoothing back out into sleep.

Nuh uh. Not happening.

John grips Matt's shoulder firmly, puts a little more oomph into the second shake. "Hey!" he repeats.

He's rewarded by that single eye cracking open, Matt scowling up at him and saying something that sounds like "mmmnghwat".

Good enough.

"Hey," John says, "is it me or has this been a _really_ fucking weird week?"

Matt just blinks at him stupidly, and for a second he thinks Matt's going to just slip back into sleep. Then when Matt shifts under the blanket, sliding onto his side to free his hand from beneath the pillow, John figures that Matt intends to flip him the bird – which, granted, he probably deserves, but honestly if he has to be up at this god-awful hour on a Saturday after less than five hours sleep then so does Matt, even if the kid _did_ just get his son here, his son that he hasn't seen in over a fucking year, his son that joked with him and filled him in on his life and didn't call him John once.

But when Matt succeeds in freeing his arm from the pillow he just scrubs a hand over his face. "Hmmm, I don't know," he says slowly, voice still sleep-roughened. 

And okay, his _son_ is only two rooms away, but that raw, husky, just-awake voice still goes straight to John's dick.

John shifts uncomfortably under the blanket, tries to focus. "Terrorists," he says. "A take-down in the precinct…"

"Unexpected family visits," Matt puts in. "On both sides."

"Kidnapping," John says. When Matt raises an eyebrow, he frowns. "You were held hostage. It counts."

"Fine," Matt agrees. "Oh, and hey, don't forget an inadvertent outing," he adds with a grin. 

John grimaces. That newspaper photo is still a sore spot, and it doesn't help that some jerkwad at the station keeps pinning a new copy up to the bulletin board in the lunchroom every time John rips the previous one down, each time the graffiti and scribbled comments more lewd than the last. 

Matt cocks his head, stretches and yawns. John takes a moment to appreciate the light, sinewy muscle revealed in the stretch before Matt flops down again, drapes his arm across his chest and burrows into his side, all soft sleep-warm skin and ridiculous floppy hair. He tucks his calf between John's, closes his eyes.

"I don't know," Matt says sleepily. "It actually sounds like a pretty typical week."


End file.
